Forrest General Healthcare Foundation Win This Car! Fundraiser Won by Couple Who Support Asbury Hospice House
Ricky and Nancy Gibson picked up the keys to their 2024 Toyota Highlander XSE Tuesday morning as the winner of this year’s Forrest General Healthcare Foundation Win This Car! fundraiser.
HATTIESBURG, Miss. – (September 6, 2024) Ricky and Nancy Gibson of Hattiesburg have been purchasing tickets for the Forrest General Healthcare Foundation’s Win This Car! fundraiser since the beginning. This year their purchase paid off when one of the tickets they purchased was the winner. This year’s fundraiser, which sold a record 2,000 tickets, benefitted Asbury Hospice House, the Foundation’s latest campaign and one dear to the Gibson family.
Last Thursday night, Ricky Gibson’s name was drawn by Foundation board chairman, Schaeffer Smith, as the winner of a fully-loaded 2024 Toyota Highlander XSE. As soon as WDAM’s live broadcast of the announcement went off the air, Forrest General Health Foundation Executive Director, Martha Dearman, started calling Gibson to give him the good news. She called and called and called. Then she sent text messages, to no avail. This went on for about 20 minutes. Although his phone was ringing constantly, on silent, Ricky, who was at home, but outside, didn’t bother to answer…not until his wife came out and told him he’d won a car.
“I think just about everybody we know called or texted to tell us,” Nancy said. “We must have received about 75 calls, including Dearman, who called Nancy early on to make sure she was calling the correct number." She said they didn’t even remember that the drawing was Thursday night.
On Tuesday, the Gibsons met Dearman and Toyota dealership officials to sign paperwork and take possession of their new vehicle, which Nancy said she will be driving.
Nancy Gibson said while they have always purchased at least one ticket, the ticket purchase took on new meaning when the donations benefitted Asbury Hospice House. “My mother spent the last week of her life at Asbury,” she said. The staff, the nurses, the doctors…I can’t say enough about Asbury and the care she received while there and Forrest General’s promotion of it,” she said. “We’ve always supported Asbury, even before we needed it. It’s a special place and Hattiesburg is so lucky to have it and Forrest General.”
While they consider themselves lucky, they said they have never won anything before. “We both feel very blessed and excited about winning the car,” Nancy said.
Funds raised from the campaign will be used for continuing the work at the Asbury Hospice House. Asbury, located on 40th Avenue in Hattiesburg, offers a home-like setting where staff can address the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of each patient, and their family. This inpatient facility provides a comforting atmosphere where families can gather and prepare in dignity.
“After eight years with Asbury, we have identified some additional areas we need to address,” said Dearman. Those include a larger family area, a children’s activity area, an outdoor pavilion for special family occasions, and a larger onsite pharmacy.
“It’s ways we can help our patients and their families, which is so much a part of hospice care,” said Dearman. “I feel incredibly humbled by the overwhelming generosity and continued support of our community and Forrest General’s employees. We feel incredibly passionate about this initiative, and we’re glad to see the Hattiesburg community supporting it, as well.”
For more information about the Forrest General Healthcare Foundation and the current campaign, visit fghfoundation.com.
